ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins Hi everyone, There will also be a big announcement relating to DWU at that event, if not before. We also have some AARs and a review of the new modding capabilities from one of our testers/modders in the works and we do plan on releasing the modding guide in whole or part before the release to help explain the new modding features. Regards, - Erik

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Remember that the evil which is now in the world will become yet more powerful, and that it is not evil which conquers evil, but only love -- Olga Romanov.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins First, there has not been a black hole of information. Universe has been announced, features posted with product page, press releases sent out with screenshots. There is information on what the release contains available to you.

We know what Matrix has announced.

There are more than a few of us that actively track games of interest. We watch what your competitors are doing and it is self-evident that you are being vastly outperformed ... but this doesn't seem to be recognised by Matrix.

For Stardrive there is recent news on IGN and PC Gamer and there has been a variety of news and reviews on various major gaming sites throughout. On the Stardrive website there is routine discussion with the community over features and video development logs.

For Galactic Civilisations there is a massive range of news on many major gaming sites, significant community discussion over features and a smorgasboard of materials available on their website.

Even my favourite mod is outperforming Matrix. With Star Trek Armada 3 for Sins of a Solar Empire I can go to their mod website and see screenshots every other day with development videos and various other hints in posts. They even scored a PC Gamer article.

In contrast for Distant Worlds, there is no news on major sites, there are no development logs and there is no discussion with the general community over features (beyond those few people you have supporting directly). All we have are some press releases/announcements that will do little to raise awareness as they have not penetrated any major gaming site / social media.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins In addition, for over a month now we've had preview copies out and available to the press, but we cannot force a preview to appear.

I can find dozens of reviews for Stardrive, Galactic Civilisations and Endless Space all over major gaming sites and social media with large subscriber bases. For Distant Worlds there is very little in comparison (beyond the fantastic but not major Space Sector). Again your competitors are vastly outperforming you. You can't force it but clearly something is not working, this a core function of what a Publisher should be delivering.

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ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins The "Home of Wargamers" event actually has a lot of mainstream press attending that love games just like DW and will give it good exposure and coverage. You should not assume that this event is focused on a niche audience. We're also promoting games like our upcoming Warhammer 40k release there.

Given the almost complete lack of mainstream coverage Distant Worlds has had to date and the comments I made earlier, some scepticism should be understandable. It would be interesting to know who you actually have attending from mainstream gaming media?

The niche title of the event is terrible if you want to promote this to a mainstream audience. Indeed in the promotional material for this event I can't even find Distant Worlds mentioned and as you have said it's only a couple of weeks away. I hope it's indeed more effective that it appears prima facie.

Why wasn't Distant Worlds presented at the Game Developers Conference? This seems like a much better opportunity to Network with the media.

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ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins We've supported DW from the start with more than most publishers would provide. We care about Elliot as well and want him to succeed as much as possible. I hope you will all be a bit more patient and determine how we've done in terms of raising awareness once DW Universe is actually released. I apologize for the delays with this release, but while some of that has been on the development side, some if it has also been specifically to allow more time for the marketing to happen as planned.

Your support to help Elliot develop the game has been terrific.

If you manage to get in the ballpark of marking performance of your competitors and improve the effectiveness of your Marketing then I'll be the first to praise Matrix.

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ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins The best thing you all could do is to help us spread the word among your friends and fellow gamers if you want DW to succeed, rather than discussing boycotts because you disagree with the promotion to date.

I object to any sort of boycott and strongly encourage the community to resist any such calling.

There are plenty of us that mention Distant Worlds elsewhere already. We would be more effective in helping if more than a handful of people in the mainstream community had even heard of Distant Worlds ...

In contrast for Distant Worlds, there is no news on major sites, there are no development logs and there is no discussion with the general community over features (beyond those few people you have supporting directly). All we have are some press releases/announcements that will do little to raise awareness as they have not penetrated any major gaming site / social media.

It's tough to have an engaged and excited fanbase when all that is "released" are small tidbits and followed by "we'll be releasing more information soon." That soon turns out being a long passage of no information at all which drains the enthusiasm from the more ardent of fans.

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ORIGINAL: Icemania The niche title of the event is terrible if you want to promote this to a mainstream audience. Indeed in the promotional material for this event I can't even find Distant Worlds mentioned and as you have said it's only a couple of weeks away. I hope it's indeed more effective that it appears prima facie.

Why wasn't Distant Worlds presented at the Game Developers Conference? This seems like a much better opportunity to Network with the media.

Because Matrix / Slitherine doesn't seem capable of maintaining multiple effective marketing campaigns. I remember when Pandora was in development it caught my attention. I tried to find out more about that game and it was a void of information. Distant Worlds is clearly not a priority for Matrix/Slitherine. If it were they could have added it to the announcements of the line-ups for this "Home of Wargamers" event.

The Game Developers Conference would have been a perfect location for Distant Worlds (and some of the other titles in the Matrix/Slitherine stable) but... it's not something Matrix/Slitherine seems interested in doing. They appear to be happy with what they are doing and all the power to them for it.

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ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins The best thing you all could do is to help us spread the word among your friends and fellow gamers if you want DW to succeed, rather than discussing boycotts because you disagree with the promotion to date.

Why would your core and most ardent fans do this when they are the ones who are getting upset and frustrated by your lack of attention towards them? Some of your die-hard fans are the ones who are getting to the point of suggesting a boycott. That should tell you something about your community management and marketing efforts.

Happy and excited customers spread the good news of a product.

Upset and frustrated customers spread the bad word faster.

You're breeding more and more of the latter with the significant lack of information and attention towards this product. These are fans who -want- to help and support and cheer for their beloved product and Matrix/Slitherine is actively working against that.

Take a moment and think about this. This is a game that people seem to fall in love with and many have spent over a hundred dollars on. That's GREAT! But... then you have these same people getting more and more upset, frustrated, and annoyed over time instead of getting more and more excited. That's a total and complete failure on the part of the publisher.

You are turning your greatest strength into some of your most vocal detractors instead of harnessing all of that incredible goodwill and having them champion the cause. All because you, as a publisher, are failing to provide them with what they want: more information, news, and attention about the coming.. whatever it is. I'd say expansion but it doesn't really seem like it will be one. Large pay-for patch-like thing for modders maybe? Or maybe for one modder since that appears to be all there is for the game. I don't follow the game -that- closely so I'm not sure. From what I have seen I am only aware of one modder so this uhh.. extra cost element of the game is for him. Or something. I don't know. There's not enough information to really judge.

Part of the issue of information delivery over DW:U is also to do with timing. It may well be just bad luck and pure coincidence, but for the majority of all real information given out on this forum there has been a disturbing pattern.

1. Forum members ask questions and get at best a passing remark about "we will have more information soon" 2. Soon passes and gets left behind in the horizon. 3. Forum members begin throwing accusations of bad publicity and terrible marketing around directing them at Matrix games going up to and including threats of boycotting the company and telling others to do likewise. 4. Matrix Games offers up some new information that seems to have existed for some time based upon previous Matrix Games statements. 5. Repeat steps 1-5.

If this was a first time thing and a new company with a new game then it would just get considered teething issues. But when things follow a pattern like that it starts to look like a deliberate thing and then when such claims get denied it starts to annoy folks, no one likes the feeling they are being lied to. I honestly hope it is just sheer coincidence but when something quacks and walks like a duck a majority of people will say it's a duck.

Leave reacting to bad situations after they happen to inept governments and satanic firms like EA. Start taking a proactive approach and the ill feelings will fall like moths at a BBQ.

"Tho' much is taken, much abides; and though we are not now that strength which in old days moved Earth and Heaven; that which we are, we are; One equal temper of heroic hearts, made weak by time and fate, but strong in will." -Tennyson

I would caution my friends to recognize that this is the last expansion in the line and is a nod to modders and would be modders.

This is clearing the way for Distant Worlds 2 I'm assuming and, I think a lot of your requests for information should be directed at that target now.

"Old soldiers never die....they just fade away...." So it is with Distant Worlds 1.

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"Tho' much is taken, much abides; and though we are not now that strength which in old days moved Earth and Heaven; that which we are, we are; One equal temper of heroic hearts, made weak by time and fate, but strong in will." -Tennyson

I respectfully disagree. You guys are jumping to all kinds of conclusions based on limited information. It's fair to criticize constructively and suggest a different approach, but this is getting over the top. First, there has not been a black hole of information. Universe has been announced, features posted with product page, press releases sent out with screenshots. There is information on what the release contains available to you.

In addition, for over a month now we've had preview copies out and available to the press, but we cannot force a preview to appear.

The "Home of Wargamers" event actually has a lot of mainstream press attending that love games just like DW and will give it good exposure and coverage. You should not assume that this event is focused on a niche audience. We're also promoting games like our upcoming Warhammer 40k release there.

We've supported DW from the start with more than most publishers would provide. We care about Elliot as well and want him to succeed as much as possible. I hope you will all be a bit more patient and determine how we've done in terms of raising awareness once DW Universe is actually released. I apologize for the delays with this release, but while some of that has been on the development side, some if it has also been specifically to allow more time for the marketing to happen as planned.

The best thing you all could do is to help us spread the word among your friends and fellow gamers if you want DW to succeed, rather than discussing boycotts because you disagree with the promotion to date.

Regards,

- Erik

Or, as something i've made several posts the past years on these forums about, you could do something yourself to promote the game other than noname press releases that nobody except people who subscribe to the Matrix Games email newsletter will see.. It's your game, it's your success (or not, depending on sales). It's not our job to do this, we're fans yes, but we're also the customers. It's ridiculous to rely 100% on your paying customers to do the PR work for you as well.

I've said it a thousand times on these forums already, and it has always been met with hostility (which is baffling to me considering how much i praised the game!). 1. Get the game on Steam. Period. There are awful **** games, literally scams that manage to get on steam. I find it very hard to believe that this game could not get on steam if you actually tried. 2. Do something, anything, to promote the game OUTSIDE of Matrix Games fans. Send preview copies to popular youtubers (those covering strategy games). Ask them to make a video on the game. Doesn't cost a dime. 3. Run some youtube video ads, target users who already searched for "4x space" games and the like. It's quite simple and doesnt cost a fortune if you narrow the target audience.

In short, do SOMETHING! I love this game to death and imo it's pretty much the best 4x space game to ever have been released, period. Far better than X Rebirth (can we agree on that?), even surpassing Galciv 2 and Moo. But nobody will know this if you don't do something YOURSELF (as in the company) to promote the game. It's not our job. Don't chill back and rely on your fans to do the work. Don't you want the game to sell even better? Heck if it was on steam and had a little 10% release day sale, DWU could possibly sell more than it already has up to this point since the first initial release! Don't you want that? You don't want to secure more funding for the sequel and grow the community and fanbase? As an indie developer you MUST have a clue about the modern climate we live in where a single popular youtube video or twitch stream can result in thousands upon thousands of extra sales. Surely? Surely you are aware of this?

You don't want that? Because i don't see any other reason for why this game has been sitting on such apathetic shoulders for the past years. It's not a niche game that "not many people like". This is 2014, if the developers are actually gamers themselves they would know this. It would sell like nuts on Steam, because many mainstream gamers (who DO love 4x space games) have never ever heard of this game, and its appearance on Steam would spread the word and success faster than it has since the first release, guaranteed. It feels like Dwarf Fortress, honestly. An incredible game that is just sitting idle because the developers don't understand what they are sitting on, don't understand the potential success or perhaps simply don't have any ambition what so ever to grow it further. It makes me sad. It makes anyone sad to see a complete and utter gem being neglected by "parents" who don't realize the potential and don't have the ambition to capitalize on it.

^^^^^^^^^^^^ Well that pretty much nailed it and did the job of Matrix Games for them, that alone should earn him/her free Romulan ale for life with the amount of potential revenue they generated for the company.

No offense, but while I'm not so far awed by the marketing effort of Universe, I really don't care much for that whole "if it was on Steam then everybody would buy it" line of reasoning either. It being on Steam, in and of itself, would not do much to hype the game. The game still needs a popularity driver. People wouldn't buy the game at its current price just because they see that now there's game number 3147 called "Distant Worlds" which they don't know the first thing about.

There has to be some event that triggers interest in the first place, and right now I'm not sure what that would be. But something is needed and I suspect that's why some of us are poking at Matrix every now and again, offering friendly (and occasionally not so friendly) encouragements.

That aside, I really wish Matrix would put together a video of that Shakturi fleet we've seen in those screenshots getting into a fight with a similarly sized alliance fleet, with torpedos and beams lighting up all over the place, and possibly with a significant third party caught in the periphery. Maybe with an orchestral build-up and some cheesy Rammstein - Feuer Frei during the fireworks? I mean, wouldn't that be a hilarious youtube video? Is there any better way of showing "epicness" than by having fleets with hundreds of ships and scores of capital ships tear each other apart?

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76 Can we have a separate sub forum for matrix marketing and steam topics?.This whole subject is too dominant in these boards and frankly a boring waste of time.

Great idea ... a one stop shop to quickly find all the most controversial posts in the Distant Worlds Forum!

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ORIGINAL: Simulation01

I would caution my friends to recognize that this is the last expansion in the line and is a nod to modders and would be modders.

This is clearing the way for Distant Worlds 2 I'm assuming and, I think a lot of your requests for information should be directed at that target now.

"Old soldiers never die....they just fade away...." So it is with Distant Worlds 1.

We recognise that but DWU is not released yet. Are there any signs that we will not have the same discussion for Distant Worlds 2? Doing a better job raising awareness could mean more modders and more quality mods for DWU, more interesting forum discussions and the larger base might justify a higher budget for Distant Worlds 2 development.

@Simulation01 They did a progress bar for Endless Space too, they also continued this after the release when they asked the community what features they want next. For DW this would be unthinkable

@Baleur I agree with your points.

Some thoughts: If you like Steam or not, getting a game promoted on the Steam Frontpage Scroll Bar alone generates much more attention then everything DW:U got yet. So the best thing would be to make a cool looking video with some Megafleets bashing on each other, some thrilling music and in the end show some of the features DW:U has to offer and get it on the Steam Frontpage. No further marketing should be needed. That would be minimal effort for maximal output. I guess thats in line with the marketing department. In the end getting DW:U to many as possible people should be something that we all want.

@topic Please get rid of that ugly font asap before you promote DW:U further. Its still hard to read after those years. I for myself shelved DW at the moment and play other games (Diablo3, The Last Federation, Dominions 4 etc) while waiting for Infos about DW:U to pop up. I used to check the forums several times a day but after seeing no progress on infos I just check one or two times a week or two. That should not be the goal for a game nearing release.

I have to agree. I think everyone else will also agree that everyone posting here wants dw to succeed... Maybe talk to the AI wars and x guys and all pull in together to make a "space" bundle.. Chop off 25% off the price or something, make sure the good mods are promoted on the steam news page and start raking in the money.

1. A lot of the statements here about what we have or have not done for past and current Distant Worlds promotion are incorrect, yet asserted as fact. 2. Distant Worlds: Universe is not yet released. It would seem reasonable to reserve final judgement and conclusions as to the Universe pre-release promotion and release decisions until it is actually released. 3. I appreciate all your feedback and I am grateful for the passion it shows for Distant Worlds. I share that same passion and I can only say that we are doing everything we can to spread the word to the entire space 4x community.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins 1. A lot of the statements here about what we have or have not done for past and current Distant Worlds promotion are incorrect, yet asserted as fact.

Granted we do not have internal information; however, there is some information we do have which matches the observations of those of us that routinely scan the Internet on titles of interest i.e. your competitors.

Consider the number of reviews according to GameRankings and Metacritic. Neither capture all reviews but nevertheless indicative.

Stardrive, Endless Space and Galactic Civilizations are all on Steam so whatever the individual views are, it does help raise awareness.

The most cursory inspection of the websites for each game will reveal the massive difference in information that is released and community interaction.

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ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins 2. Distant Worlds: Universe is not yet released. It would seem reasonable to reserve final judgement and conclusions as to the Universe pre-release promotion and release decisions until it is actually released.

Fully agree, I'm withholding judgement, but concerned about the status quo. Matrix needs to acknowledge that past marketing performance is inferior and then develop a plan to improve, which I hope Matrix is about to implement for Universe, then I'll sing from the rooftops.

First, I'd like far more people to know about DW than know about it now. I've personally put a lot of effort into that, but I know that we as a company have also reached out to many mainstream and independent journalists, bloggers and youtubers to raise awareness. For various reasons, I agree that these other releases are at this point still better known.

We do hope to address that with Universe, both because it will for the first time (since the original release) offer a single unified release and starting point and also for other reasons. I realize much of this is still not apparent to the community, but my hope and expectation is that by the time Universe promotion is complete and it is released, it will be the most widely known of all the DW releases. I know that in our internal discussions, that is the goal and what our marketing folks are working towards and we all share basically the same goals for DW that are expressed here by the community.

It's the best space 4x strategy game out there now in our opinion as well and we want everyone who likes these kinds of games to be aware of it and have a chance to form their own opinion.

I completely agree with this statement, despite the game's flaws (e.g can I mention font size again?). And I've played pretty much every space 4x pc game released over the last 25 years - all I've been able to get my hands on anyway.

Since I first started playing Legends, last year, every new space 4x I've played has simply driven me straight back to DW.

First, I'd like far more people to know about DW than know about it now. I've personally put a lot of effort into that, but I know that we as a company have also reached out to many mainstream and independent journalists, bloggers and youtubers to raise awareness. For various reasons, I agree that these other releases are at this point still better known.

We do hope to address that with Universe, both because it will for the first time (since the original release) offer a single unified release and starting point and also for other reasons. I realize much of this is still not apparent to the community, but my hope and expectation is that by the time Universe promotion is complete and it is released, it will be the most widely known of all the DW releases. I know that in our internal discussions, that is the goal and what our marketing folks are working towards and we all share basically the same goals for DW that are expressed here by the community.

It's the best space 4x strategy game out there now in our opinion as well and we want everyone who likes these kinds of games to be aware of it and have a chance to form their own opinion.

Regards,

- Erik

Skipping around the not seeing the background stuff happening - which is very true and difficult to see - I am curious about the latter part of your response.

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ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

It's the best space 4x strategy game out there now in our opinion as well and we want everyone who likes these kinds of games to be aware of it and have a chance to form their own opinion.

If this is true, and I believe you believe it is, why is it that latest press release for the upcoming Home of the Wargamers' event didn't make mention of Distant Worlds at all?

That's part of the disconnect between what is written here in the forum and what is presented to the larger audience. I read that you want this game to be successful and that you believe it to be amazing and then I look at your official stance and there is nothing about Distant Worlds.

From that I can only conclude that either, officially, Matrix/Slitherine doesn't really expect a lot from Distant Worlds or the marketing team is inept and forgot to mention a game that they believe to be the best 4x strategy game out there. Either option looks really bad.

Here's the direct quote from the latest press release that I could find about Home of the Wargamers:

The room we are going to reveal to you now is called the Bishops Room. The Bishops Room will be dedicated to fantasy andscience-fiction. In this room we will present you several details on Sovereignty: Crown of Kings, The latest version of Space Program Manager and of course an update on the development of the game many sci-fi fans are waiting for; Warhammer 40.000 Armageddon.

This is the sort of thing that leaves fans who really want to cheer for their game and share it with everyone with a foul taste in their mouth. After all, if what is being written is true (and, really, I believe it to be true and that you -do- care about this product) then why in the world is that when opportunities arise to promote the product they are ignored? I mean this is a Slitherine/Matrix created event. One would think that adding the words "upcoming Distant Worlds expansion" or "upcoming relaunch of the critically acclaimed Distant Worlds: Universe" into that sentence wouldn't be hard.

It's odd and yet it is surprisingly consistent that games in the Matrix/Slitherine stable often receive this lack of official attention. This, in turn, leads to the speculation of what is done and what isn't being done. When the public results of all the background stuff amounts to very little then rightly or wrongly an easy conclusion to draw is that there is very little background stuff that happens.

After all, if something is failing year after year one would think that a new approach would be tried and said new approach would be announced with some fanfare just to let people know stuff is happening.

As I wrote earlier, it's fascinating to watch so thank you for the case study. I appreciate it because it is interesting to follow.

The reason it's not mentioned in that particular release is that it only mentions one of the four rooms where we will be showing games to the press and that's not the room that has Distant Worlds: Universe in it. The information on the press event is mainly aimed at the press and as far as I know they have been informed as to all the games that will be featured. I expect that there will be another announcement including all the games to be shown and as before, lots of coverage during and after the event.

As I said above, an analysis of the DWU promotion is probably best done once that promotion is over, as assumptions that we are trying nothing new or doing relatively little are otherwise uninformed, but I understand the concern and frustration in the community and I'll be relaying that to our marketing team as well.